Video: Installing the Best Workflow color settings

In this exercise, which is designed to suit the needs of Windows and Macintosh people alike, I'm going to show you how to install a group of color settings that I've created in advance for you, that go by the name Best Workflow. So here's the idea, in order to get consistent colors across the various Creative Suite applications, as well as take advantage of the rich array of colors that are available to you in these powerhouse graphics programs like Illustrator and Photoshop and so on, and to give the colors that you see onscreen half a chance of outputting accurately, you need a suite-wide color management engine, and Creative Suite has just such an engine. It goes by the name ACE or Adobe Color Engine, which is a really great thing by the way.

In Illustrator CS5 One-on-One: Advanced, author and industry expert Deke McClelland teaches how to take advantage of the wide array of dynamic features in Illustrator CS5. This course demonstrates how to apply these features to paths, groups, and editable text to create professional-quality artwork. The course covers Live Trace, Live Paint, and Live Color, as well as symbols, gradients, exporting, and integration with Photoshop. Exercise files accompany the course.

Installing the Best Workflow color settings

In this exercise, which is designed to suit the needs of Windows andMacintosh people alike,I'm going to show you how to install a group of color settings that I've createdin advance for you, that go by the name Best Workflow.So here's the idea, in order to get consistent colors across the variousCreative Suite applications, as well as take advantage of the rich array ofcolors that are available to you in these powerhouse graphics programs likeIllustrator and Photoshop and so on, and to give the colors that you seeonscreen half a chance of outputting accurately, you need a suite-wide colormanagement engine, and Creative Suite has just such an engine. It goes by thename ACE or Adobe Color Engine, which is a really great thing by the way.

The only little black cloud on the horizon here is that Adobe has seen fit toimpose some default color settings that don't ideally suit the needs of workingprofessionals or those who aspire to achieve the best results.So what I am going to have you do is just switch things out ever so slightly, byinstalling a file, and let me show you that file.It's this guy right there, Best Workflow CS5.csf.We are going to install that, yet again, in a very specific location, and I amgoing to show you that location just as I did when we installed dekeKeys.

I'll show you what those locations are in the various platforms, and then I'llshow you a special trick that gets you to that location more easily on a PC,doesn't work on the Mac, but that's okay, we'll get you there.So to show you those locations, I am going to open this image right here, it'scalled Best Workflow instructions.tiff, so let's open that up inside ofPhotoshop, it's this file as you can see, and I'll switch to the fullscreen modeso that we can take it in in detail.Copy the file Best Workflow CS5.csf to a location on your hard drivedepending on your platform.

So this is where it's going to go on the PC, on one of these two locations, butas I say, I got a trick for you, so you can hold on for a moment, but still,might as well make yourself aware of it.Under Windows XP, it's going to be on the C drive inside Documents and Settingsinside the user folder, user is your computer login name of course, inside theApplication Data folder, spelled out under XP, and then you go into Adobe, theninto Color, then into Settings.Under Windows 7 and Vista, it's C, then the Users folder, then user - probablyyour name - AppData instead of Application Data spelled out, Roaming, Adobe, Color, and Settings.

So just bear that in mind, you Windows people, I am going to show you a betterway in just a moment.On the Mac you go to the Finder, the desktop level of your computer, and youchoose the Home Command from the Go menu, incidentally this has a keyboardshortcut of Cmd+Shift+H, in case you're curious.Then you go ahead and open this folder, the Library folder, which you'll seeinside of Home, Application Support, then go into Adobe, then into Color, and then into the Settings folder.And then go ahead and copy that Best Workflow CS5.csf file from the 00_setupfolder to this settings folder right there.

All right, so there we have it, everybody, Macintosh and Windows people, I wantyou to go to Illustrator.Let's go over to the Illustrator application here and then go up to theEdit menu and choose the Color Settings command, or you can pressCtrl+Shift+K, Cmd+Shift+K on a Mac, that brings up the color settingsdialog box right here.Now by default settings will probably say, North American General Purpose2, which goes ahead and uses the sRGB workspace, which is not an idealspace for professionals.I'll just put it that way, we'll get into more detail about it in the nextexercise, but here's what you do.

Those of you were working on the Mac just wait a moment.You PC people go ahead and click on the Load button and you'll go right to thatfolder I was telling you about, notice we are looking at the contents of theDeke McClelland folder, that's my user folder, inside of AppData, Roaming, thenwe are inside the Adobe folder, Color, and then Settings.So we are right where we need to be, under Windows 7,Windows Vista, or Windows XP. It's going to be a different path on XP, but youwill be at the right location.Then I want you to go ahead and bring up that 00_setup folder right there, andgrab Best Workflow CS5.csf and drag it and drop it into that dialog box window.

So go ahead and drop it in there, and then you go ahead and copy that file tothe desired location just like that.Now at this point you would click on the open button, and that will go ahead andopen the Best Workflow Settings as you see right there.Now, if you're working along with me on a Mac, because you already copied thefile to the proper location, what you need to do is click this down pointingarrowhead and choose Best Workflow CS5 from the list and that will go ahead andload the base settings that you need to be using, click OK in order to applythose settings to Illustrator.

In the next exercise, I am going to run through the color settings that wejust modified.

Learn by watching, listening, and doing, Exercise files are the same files the author uses in the course, so you can download them and follow along Premium memberships include access to all exercise files in the library.

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Learn by watching, listening, and doing! Exercise files are the same files the author uses in the course, so you can download them and follow along. Exercise files are available with all Premium memberships.
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